Bomberman LiveReview

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Somebody set up us the bomb.

By David Craddock

I have a confession to make--this is the first time I've ever played a Bomberman game. Yes, ever. I've seen friends play, and it always looked like a lot of fun, but for whatever reason, I never picked up a controller and joined in the madness myself. When given the opportunity to review Bomberman Live, I took it gladly. Finally, my chance to experience action-puzzle greatness had arrived--or had it? Would my first Bomberman experience live up to the series' considerable hype and following, or would it be a dud?

Bomberman Live features several arenas on which to detonate friends and strangers alike. Each level has distinct features that separate it from the rest of the pack. Lost World, for example, contains pits of sinking sand that render players motionless for a short period of time. Another stage contains trap doors that drop players into fire and send them back to their starting position devoid of any of their precious power-ups. Veteran bomber-men will be happy to know that the classic Bomberman map has been included, though it's arguably the most lackluster out of all eight available arenas.

Bomberman Live's game modes, combined with its unique arenas, are what make it one of the most diverse games available on Xbox Live Arcade, as any game mode can be played on any map. Paint Bomb has players bombing tiles to paint them a pre-assigned color; the player with the most painted tiles at the end of a preset time wins the game. Each time a player falls victim to a bomb, that player gets to ride around the arena's perimeter in the revenge cart, which allows them to throw bombs all across the map. Should another player get bombed, that player will take over the revenge cart and allow its previous handler to get back into the action.

Zombie mode is similar, except that players are invulnerable during the entire length of the game, which means no revenge cart. I found this mode to be rather boring, as the excitement of controlling the cart in an effort to seek revenge on the player who removed me from the game was a large part of the mode's appeal. Options exist to randomly play any given game mode on any given map, so no players should be without a mode of play that they can call their favorite.

Being a newcomer to the Bomberman experience, I decided to get my feet wet in a local game against AI-controlled opponents before jumping online. The AI provided an adequate challenge, but although its difficulty level can be altered, I noticed it standing around waiting to get bombed or sometimes running against a wall quite often. New and old Bomberman players alike should visit Bomberman's single-player offerings to learn the modes, maps, and power-ups, but I don't recommend staying too long, as the AI doesn't provide much challenge or excitement.

Multiplayer, of course, is what Bomberman is all about. Competing against 7 other opponents provides for a great experience of mayhem and on-edge, fast-thinking strategies. Bombs detonating everywhere, power-ups popping up every few steps, and environmental hazards add to the calamity that is a multiplayer session of Bomberman. It's a lot of fun, and perhaps my favorite aspect of the experience was implementing strategies that were rather useless in single-player gaming. The skull power-up bestows a random curse such as "Bomberrhea" on players, which causes those infected to drop bombs randomly and quite often. Aimlessly dropping bombs in the midst of a group of players trying to carefully make their way to a certain part of the map was quite satisfying.

Learning Bomberman's power-ups takes on a whole new dimension when playing online, since the action is often too frantic to glance at available upgrades for more than half a second. Players will need to learn which upgrades should be used online, and which should not. Bomb-Ups increase the number of bombs players can set, and this is always a good thing, but what about Fire-Ups, which increase each bomb's blast radius? Multiplayer games with lots of players tend to be rather congested, so I found it prudent to increase my radius only to a certain point, since maneuverability is often an issue. It sounds like an annoyance, but it's just another clever way that Bomberman forces players to really think about their actions instead of acting on impulse, even in the midst of pure chaos.

Perhaps the most appealing facet of multiplayer is the ability to take local players onto Xbox Live. This may be the best manifestation of the game's mix-and-match play style, as it could be argued that Bomberman's fast-paced gameplay is best enjoyed in a room full of friends.

The Verdict

If there's one thing I can't stand, it's contributing to the proverbial hype machine, but I honestly didn't want to stop playing Bomberman Live to write this review. The game is a ton of fun, very dynamic in terms of gameplay, and more than worth the asking price of 800 Microsoft Points ($10USD).